Mumia Abu-Jamal won’t face death penalty

Mumia Abu-Jamal to avoid death penalty: Prosecutors end quest against former Black Panther

PHILADELPHIA — Philadelphia prosecutors on Wednesday dropped a decades-old quest to get the death penalty against Mumia Abu-Jamal, a former Black Panther militant convicted in a racially charged case of killing a police officer in 1981.

District Attorney Seth Williams took the decision after legal setbacks, but said he had acted reluctantly and still believed that the original sentence of capital punishment had been “appropriate.”

“The decision to end this fight was not an easy one,” he said in a statement.

The decision comes months after a U.S. appeals court ordered a new sentencing hearing because of potentially misleading jury instructions. The U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in the case, presenting prosecutors an uphill battle if they wanted to get the original sentence confirmed.

Abu-Jamal’s defence team welcomed the announcement.

“The district attorney did the right thing,” John Payton said. “After three long decades, it was time to bring the quest for a death sentence for Mr Abu-Jamal to an end.”

Jamal, 57, a former member of the separatist Black Panther Party and former radio journalist, will instead spend the rest of his life in prison for the 1981 murder of Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner, who was white.

He is represented by lawyers from the legal fund of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and has received support from celebrities and a network of well-wishers.

Law professor Judith Ritter, also part of his legal team, said that justice had been “served when a death sentence from a misinformed jury is overturned.”

To his supporters, Abu-Jamal was an international symbol of a racist justice system and police brutality who had been framed for his political views.

“There has never been a doubt in my mind that Mumia Abu-Jamal shot and killed Officer Faulkner, and I believe the appropriate sentence was handed down in 1982,” Williams said.

“While Abu-Jamal will no longer be facing the death penalty, he will remain behind bars for the rest of his life, and that is exactly where he belongs,” he added.

“After 30 years of waiting, the time remaining before Abu-Jamal stands before his ultimate judge doesn’t seem quite so far off as it once did when I was younger. I look forward to that day,” said Faulkner’s widow, Maureen.